How & why people shit on themselves

Nowadays a huge number of people are waking up to the fact that human society/civilization is severely dysfunctional in every country of the world. In order to create the world's first civilized society, one of the most important problems to solve is the fact that many people sabotage themselves.

Many people are their own worst enemy. This is difficult to believe. It makes no sense. Nevertheless, it is a widespread disorder in the general populace.

🗳️ For example: Voting to harm yourself

The widespread self-sabotage is easier to see in a country that has direct democracy such as Switzerland. With direct democracy, you can directly see what the citizens are voting for and against, and the results are shocking.

Note that I am not picking on Switzerland. Switzerland is merely an example that I am using in this article. The same applies elsewhere – people in other countries have the same bad behavior as in Switzerland. It is just easier to see the truth in Switzerland thanks to the direct democracy.

In 2012, the Swiss population voted on the question of whether to give all employees a minimum of six weeks of vacation per year. 67% voted “No”. This means you cannot blame the politicians, because the majority of the citizens directly voted to NOT give themselves at least six weeks of vacation per year.

In 2002, the Swiss population voted on the question of whether to reduce the working week from 42 hours to 36 hours in order to give people a life outside of work, work, work, and to give parents more time to raise their children. Guess what? 75% of the population voted “No”. Again, you can see that this suffering is clearly self-inflicted, not caused by the politicians.

Furthermore, the majority of people voted against proposals to make homes more affordable to purchase and to rent.

In 2012, the Swiss population voted on whether to give home buyers assistance with savings to help people get out of the rent trap and own their own home. A great idea, but 69% of the population voted “No”.

In 2020, the Swiss population voted on the “more affordable housing” initiative. This was another great idea that would make life less stressful, but 57% voted “No”. So yet again the majority of the population voted in favor of continuing their own suffering.

In 2012, the Swiss population voted on a proposal to secure the housing in old age, so that old people in retirement do not get forced to sell their home and live on the street or wherever. 53% voted “No”. This means the majority of people think that it is OK to kick old people out of their homes. This even includes kicking themselves out!

In 2016, the Swiss population voted on a proposal to provide a Universal Basic Income (UBI) to everybody. This would be a massive stress relief and a massive gain in the happiness of the general population, but 77% voted “No”. Apparently most people love to suffer.

I could provide even more examples of how the majority of the population votes as if they are in love with their own suffering and misery, but I believe that is enough examples for today. You get the drift.

So, next time someone wants to blame the politicians or “the media” or a secret society or “the 1%” for his/her miserable life of suffering and endless work and the unaffordable cost of living/children/childcare/education and not enough vacation days and unaffordable health insurance, just remember, even when people have direct democracy, and even when people have the power to make their lives better and happier, the majority of people vote in favor of continuing their own suffering and misery.

📉 Self-sabotage in the stockmarket

Some people are friends of a successful wealthy trader. You would think that these friends could likewise become wealthy by simply copying their trader friend and performing the same trades.

The following is a good example from Gary Stevenson - Citibank’s most profitable trader in 2011 and the author of the book “The Trading Game” (2025).

“some friends of mine [...] they said, [...] ‘What can I do?’ [...] I just told them what I was doing, which was, I’m putting some bets on asset prices going up, and you can do that in these various ways. [...] what is really interesting is, what happened to both of these friends was quite similar, which was, I told them, okay, the gold price is going to go up, [...] this is how you do it.

They went off, and they bet on the gold price, and then the gold price went up and up and up and up, and eventually maybe about six months later, it had quite a sharp fall, but it was still massively higher than when I put the bet on, so you know, your money went up, and you lost a bit of money.

Both of my friends called me up separately, and they were like, ‘Oh my God, Gary, what do I do?’ And I was like, well, you know, you don’t do anything. We made a lot of money, and then we lost a bit of money, and overall we’ve still made a lot of money.

They were like, in both cases, they said, ‘No, you don’t understand. I’m out. I’m out. I’ve lost everything.’

And I was like, how have you managed to lose money when the position is way above where I told you to start?

It’s super interesting psychologically. Both people did pretty much the exact same thing. [...] they started to put a lot more trades on; put a lot more bets on; increase the size of their bets, and then when it came down a little bit, their other bets were basically the same bet in other ways, everything came down, and they ran out of money.

[...] if you look at what these people did, it’s quite mad what they did, because they had a trading recommendation from me – a very successful professional trader. What they should have done is just do the thing that I told them to do, but they didn’t do that.”

Gary attributed their failures to false beliefs about their own skills:

“they both just went totally insane, and they didn’t say anything to me. They bought a ton more gold; they bought silver; they bought platinum; they bought palladium; they bought bitcoin; they’re buying Telsa and not telling me any of this stuff. [...]

They basically became sort of convinced that they themselves are really good traders, and they did a load of stuff which I didn’t them to do, and they bought loads basically, and then it came down, and they lost a ton of money.

So, this is why I don’t try and teach people to trade, basically. The few times I’ve given friends trading recommendations, most of the time, they managed to lose a ton of money.”

They felt a need to believe that they are skillful traders, and so they deluded themselves into believing what they wanted to believe. They did not truly want to become rich via assistance from Gary, rather they wanted to have the same trading skills as Gary so that they could become rich by themselves without any assistance.

As Gary said, they should have simply done exactly what he told them to do, and then they would have become rich just like him. However, they sabotaged their own success, because they felt like they did not deserve to be rich, or they felt that they had not earned it.

💰 Another example: Lottery winners try hard to undo their win

It is quite common for lottery winners to work hard on undoing their good fortune and reverting back to their former status (or even worse). Many examples exist. It seems like people feel that they do not deserve to be happy. They seem to feel guilty about their happiness or success, and so they sabotage their own life.

For example, Michael C. won nearly 10 million (GBP) in the UK National Lottery in 2002. Merely four years later, the BBC reported that Michael was almost broke, having spent his fortune on parties, prostitutes, drugs, jewellery, cars, and a destruction derby racetrack in his backyard. In 2010, Michael returned to his old job as a garbage collector, saying he had no regrets about the way in which he had spent his winnings.

The Huffington Post reported in 2019:

“Roger and Lara Griffiths won £1.8m on the UK National Lottery in 2005, allowing them both to pursue their hobbies. She splurged on designer handbags and he recorded an album with the band he played with in university. Oh, and they also bought a massive house. Then began a catalogue of misfortune as they split up over affair allegations, their house burnt down and then Roger – who was in charge of the money – admitted that it was all gone. In 2013, Roger reportedly had £7 left in the bank.”

The Huffington Post also reported:

“Billie Bob Harrell, Jr. won $31m on the Texas lotto and, at first, thought his problems were over. He quit his job and gave much of his fortune to help those in need. [...] he was found dead by his son with a self-inflicted head wound just two years after his win.”

That is only a few examples out of many cases in the sad history of lottery winners.

🙅‍♂️ The rejection of utopia

In the movie “The Matrix” (1999), Agent Smith famously says:

“Did you know that the first Matrix was designed to be a perfect human world? Where none suffered, where everyone would be happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program. Entire crops were lost.

Some believed we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world. But I believe that, as a species, human beings define their reality through suffering and misery.

The perfect world was a dream that your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up from. Which is why the Matrix was re-designed to this: the peak of your civilization.”

If you think about what Agent Smith said and compare it with the behavior of humans in real life, the resemblance is uncanny. This part of the movie is a reflection of the self-harming behavior of many humans in real life.

👿 The evil nature of self-sacrifice

Self-sacrifice is the root of all evil and the path to eternal damnation.

OK, I admit that I exaggerated for dramatic effect. 😃

To say it more accurately, self-sacrifice is one of the biggest reasons why the world is so crazy. If human self-sacrifice was not so prevalent, then human society would not be so badly broken as it is.

Sacrificing yourself to protect your own child is understandable, but many humans think it is great to sacrifice themselves for total strangers. They think that it is admirable. In reality, it is evil behavior.

For example, if self-sacrifice was not so prevalent, then World War 1 & 2 would not have occurred. Insane dictators/tyrants are capable of launching world wars only because they can find so many people that are willing to sacrifice themselves.

To say that self-sacrifice is the root of all evil is an exaggeration, but it is no exaggeration to say that self-sacrifice causes massive suffering, destruction, and chaos in the world.

The most disturbing and sickening aspect of it is that evil self-sacrificial people are the people that most strongly believe that they are very good people! This is an additional reason why self-sacrifice is usually evil behavior.

🤪 The worldwide masochism pandemic

There is a worldwide pandemic of Masochistic Personality Disorder (or at least self-sabotage).

“What fascinates me about humanity is that so many people are looking for reasons to be unhappy. It's only when they're mired in their self-made misery that they are truly content.” (Source: The Sandman, S1E9, 2022)

Most humans need some serious therapy or even hardcore medications. Considering the widespread prevalence of masochism and self-sabotage, the world's first civilized society can only be created successfully if the masochism pandemic is solved first.

How did so much masochism evolve in humans? The answer is tribalism. Masochism is a survival strategy: Sacrifice yourself for the benefit of the brutal alpha male of the tribe, and he will keep you alive in return. This is a miserable survival strategy, but it works just well enough to enable reproduction of the genes for masochism.

Research and development are needed to develop genetic tests and effective therapies or medications to eliminate masochism and self-harm in the general populace.

In the meantime, you can improve your own life by engaging in self-reflection. You can ask yourself these questions:

• “Do I ever sabotage my own success and/or happiness?”

• “Why do I sabotage my own life?”

• “How can I become more aware of my self-sabotage or masochism?”

• “How can I stop myself from choosing things that are bad for me?”

• “How can I persuade my subconscious mind to accept that I deserve to be happy and free?”